Paint, a hazardous material, is easily disposed of in San Joaquin County:• You can take it to the Household Hazardous Waste facility near Stockton Metropolitan Airport, 7850 R.A. Bridgefo...

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Making it easy

Paint, a hazardous material, is easily disposed of in San Joaquin County:

• You can take it to the Household Hazardous Waste facility near Stockton Metropolitan Airport, 7850 R.A. Bridgeford St. Open to the public 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Thursday through Saturday. Free to residents; $20 processing fee for businesses. About half of the paint collected there is placed in a "reuse room" and is available to the public to take home.

• Eleven stores will accept up to 5 gallons of water-based paint under a county program that started more than three years ago. For a list, visit sjgov.org/solidwaste. Scroll down and click on "Paints and Coatings."

• Both water-based and oil-based paint are also accepted at nine other stores under a new state program called PaintCare. Visit paintcare.org for a list of locations.

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It's never been easier - or cheaper - to legally dispose of unwanted paint in San Joaquin County.

So why are people still dumping this hazardous waste along roadsides or even into creeks and streams?

About 500 gallons of paint was illegally abandoned last year, according to two dozen separate reports from the California Emergency Management Agency.

And the first case of 2013 is already on the books. On the afternoon of Jan. 4, a passer-by found four containers of latex paint sitting on the side of Woodbridge Road a mile east of Interstate 5.

None of the paint spilled.

But that's not always the case.

Last February, in an especially egregious example, paint containers were hurled off a bridge into Mosher Slough northeast of Stockton, bursting open and splattering across the channel.

Abandoned paint and used motor oil are among the most common situations investigated by the county's Environmental Health Department, said program coordinator Kasey Foley.

"It seems silly that we have to do this every week," she said, given the disposal options that are available.

More than three years ago, San Joaquin County started a program allowing residents to drop off unwanted paint for free at stores across the region.

Today, even more locations have been added under a new state program. For the first time, every city in San Joaquin County has a place residents can take paint, said Kimbra Andrews, a management analyst with the county's Public Works Department.

Residents and businesses can also deliver paint to the county's Household Hazardous Waste facility near Stockton Metropolitan Airport. It's free for residents; businesses face a $20 processing fee, but other costs are now being waived, Andrews said.

She spoke earlier this week at the hazardous waste facility, where a man in a white protective suit with a respirator over his face was processing cans of paint that will be sent to a recycler for use in other products.

Anywhere from 5,000 to 8,000 pounds of paint arrive there each week. Paint that still appears usable is set aside in a small room where members of the public can come pick out what they need, free of charge, three days a week.

In that sense, every gallon of paint dumped into a creek is a gallon of paint that could have gone to a constructive purpose - repainting your bedroom, perhaps. The 500 gallons abandoned or dumped last year is about equal to an entire week's worth of paint dropped off at the hazardous waste facility.

It's not clear who was responsible for last year's most heinous creek dumping, Foley said.

"We're keeping our eyes open to see if it starts up again," she said.

More routine incidents, however, of paint cans abandoned in remote corners of the county have continued, despite the new programs.